The Waiting Darkness
by anonmachine
Summary: Flack unwisely takes on a bet with Danny and poor Aiden is dragged into the mess. Can Flack win the bet and walk away with his pride intact? Or will the uninviting darkness scare him away?


**Disclaimer: **I, sadly, do not own any recognizable characters here. All recognizable characters belong respectively to their owners. I do not earn any profit from the publishing or in the writing of this fic.

**Author's note:** My second drabble into CSI fandom. After the response to my other little ficlet, I decided to write another one, centring on the relationship between Aiden and Flack.

Inspiration of this fic actually came from episode fifteen, season one of CSI New York, _Till Death Do Us Part_. Remember the scene with Flack all nervous about going into the "haunted" monastery?

Yeap…

Also, I want to add that since CSI is mainly an American series and therefore CSI fanfictions writers over here are predominantly American, I would just like to say that my country was under the British rule, and so we use the British spelling and stuff. Nothing really different, but I just wanted to say it anyway.

PWP – Plot? What Plot?

* * *

He is petrified, I can tell; the whites of his eyes clearly showing. Despite his natural male instinct to put on a display of courage and bravery, Detective Donald Flack Jr. is quaking in his shoes.

I smirk.

He stuffs his hands into his pockets to hide them from view. But too late; I saw that they were shaking badly. I tried unsuccessfully to stifle my laughter.

Flack threw me a dirty look and I returned it with a sunny grin.

'I really do not want to be here,' he says shifting his weight restlessly from one foot to the other. He glances around him nervously, his shoulders tensed.

'Relax, Flack,' I told him, poking him playfully in the chest.

'I _am _relaxed!' he snapped, a faint pink tinge colouring his cheeks.

I chuckled, shaking my head. Clearly, the detective was, to use the understated term, _uneasy. _I caught him treating our surroundings with another uncomfortable sweep of his eyes.

'C'mon,' I said, holding out a hand for him to take. Reluctantly, he takes it. Another poke at his lost courage balanced on the tip of my tongue but I swallowed it – he has suffered enough.

'I heard that people have actually gone in this place and have come out... changed,' he whispered, his normally confident tone laced with a pinch of uncertainty.

'It's not that bad!'

His grip tightens around my fingers. 'Aiden!' he hisses, blue eyes adoringly wide, 'let's just get out of here while we still can!'

Flack starts to drag me away, his steps getting quicker and more frantic. I laughed, digging my heels into the pavement.

'Flack! Be reasonable!'

'I am being reasonable! _Very_ reasonable!'

'No, you're not!' I twisted my hand from his grip. I glared at him; arms crossed in front of me and raised an eyebrow.

Little beads of sweat peppered his forehead, even on a cool night such as this. His complexion was flushed and he stuck his fists into his pockets again abashedly.

The art of prying information is a delicate one, as one learns in Interrogating 101. There are many ways to get what you want to know, some of them less… enjoyable to the subject.

But well...I considered Flack my friend, so I chose the gentle approach.

'Flack?'

No response, not even a non-committal grunt or a twitch of his broad shoulders to indicate that he had even heard me. His face is turned away from me, refusing to meet my gaze.

'What's the matter? C'mon, you can tell me…'

I saw the droop in the shoulders; something I recognise when I interrogate suspects – defeat. He sighed softly and I neared him, and cupped a hand under his chin and gently forced him to look me in the eye.

Blue eyes blinked pleadingly at me.

'Well?'

'Aiden, please don't laugh…' he trailed off.

'I won't laugh, I promise.'

He is silent for a minute and I waited patiently, letting him come out with it in his own time.

'I just don't like these type of things.'

He must have seen the look of confusion in my face because he sighed again.

'I… don't like dark, creepy places, okay?'

My eyebrows threatened to leave my forehead but I wrestled them back into place.

Dark, creepy places? Sure, the old building is old and creaky and definitely in dire need of repair and a new paint job, but it is not really that bad. Most of the dusty windows were either cracked or broken, and half rotten doors yawned into unknown darkness… and the weird thumping noises caused by… well, I don't know _what _exactly, but there's definitely a reasonable explanation for that.

And the scrabbling noises upstairs that sounded like claws - very sharp claws - on wood… must be rats…

Really big rats…

And the rhythmic dripping of water added to the eerie orchestra.

And the creepy screaming wind...

Suddenly, I didn't really feel like going in.

'Aiden?'

I turn to him. 'Forget it. Let's just tell Danny we did and leave it at that.'

A relieved grin spreads on his face. 'But he'd know that we didn't and we'd lose the bet!'

'No, _you _would lose the bet, not me. I wasn't the one who said I wasn't afraid of ghost and things and _I _was _definitely _not the one who volunteered this place! Me? I agreed to tag along with you because Danny couldn't be here to make sure you _did _spend the night here. And besides, I just remembered that I have a cat to feed!'

'Since when you have a cat?'

'Since… since… whenever, I don't know! It's not exactly mine, but I feed it sometimes,' I say somewhat defensively.

A low mournful yowl came from deep inside the house and I felt the hair on my neck rise.

I grabbed his hand in fright, 'Let's get out of here!'

* * *

THE END

What exactly happened?

Well, Danny heard that Flack is a bit jumpy on things that involve restless spirits and similar things and had challenged Flack to spend the night in a supposedly haunted house. And Aiden is there to make sure Flack completes his task.

Any feedback are welcomed and thanks for reading!


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